Gary Anthony Sanders lived down the street from Penny. He spent almost half of his 52 years in prison. He’s 6-foot-3.

That one-foot difference means a lot. He towered over her while she fought for her life. He’s bigger and stronger. His wrists are so big, a police officer testified, that it was hard to put handcuffs on him.

For the past year, that fight haunted her family and friends. At the trial last week, it became clearer what may have happened on June 26, 2013.

Sanders did yard work for Penny. So when he knocks on her door, she opens it.

He probably asks for work. She says no. But he needs money.

He grabs her. She resists, scratching him. Now he knows she has to die. Otherwise comes prison. The ex-con is on parole until 2032.

He grabs her neck. Breaks two bones in her throat. Penny keeps fighting.

He finds a kitchen knife. She blocks his swipes with her arms. He stabs her there.

She runs to the living room and pulls out her gun. He smacks it out of her hand.

She runs away. He shoots her in the back.

Then he shoots her in the head.

He covers her body with a doggie bed. Ransacks her house. Takes her stuff.

Then he makes every mistake a killer can make.

He’s sweaty from his work. He drinks from a water bottle, which he leaves behind. Thank you, fingerprints and DNA.

He leaves the knife in the sink. Her blood on the blade. His DNA on the handle.

He takes the gun, which is never seen again.

Outside, he tries to sell her lawn equipment to a neighbor. He trots to a nearby pawnshop to unload more. The manager won’t accept her laptop because he doesn’t have the power cord. He says he can tell it doesn’t belong to Sanders.

Sanders goes back to the house. Takes her TV. Then back to the pawnshop, where he’s videotaped a second time.

He visits a prostitute in a motel off Interstate 35E. They get high, have sex. He leaves her some of Penny’s jewelry on the nightstand.

Another woman, his girlfriend who picks him up at the motel, notices bruises on his hands and blood on his pants. She asks about it. He changes the subject.

She hears that Penny was killed and that he’s wanted for questioning. She persuades him to turn himself in. They stand outside the police station, arguing.

“Well, if you didn’t do nothing, the truth will set you free,” she tells him. “Let’s go and find out what’s going on.”

Later, the girlfriend finds blood on a shoe he left at her house. She gives the shoe to police. It’s Penny’s blood.

Police wrap up their investigation in a few days. “Everything was working with the case,” a homicide detective says.

Sanders’ defense by his court-appointed lawyer is bare. His lawyer, Paul Johnson, doesn’t present any witnesses and hardly cross-examines witnesses called by prosecutor Rachel Burris.

A main argument he makes to the jury is that Sanders couldn’t be the killer. Nobody could leave that many obvious clues everywhere.

“People don’t commit crimes so they can be caught,” he says. “It just doesn’t make sense.”

Exactly.

Prosecutor Burris says in her closing that all Sanders wanted was money to visit his prostitute for sex and drugs. “A date and dope,” she calls it. The jury leaves the courtroom to make a decision.

Penny’s place in life was to make it better for everyone else. She organized a group of authors and performers and helped place them before audiences. She ran an annual showcase to show off her stable of talent. I was her event’s master of ceremonies.

Last year, two weeks after she died, we held the event in her honor.

We ate her peach cobbler and homemade brownies (“with real butter!” she used to brag) that her family found frozen in the freezer. We toasted her life. We promised to remember her.

Remember how she wore her long, flowing skirts that twirled when she walked around a room greeting everyone. Remember her constant smile and words of praise for her authors and performers. Remember her cobbler and brownies with real butter.

The jury members come back into the courtroom. Time away? 28 minutes. Barely enough to elect a foreman, sip a glass of water and take a vote around the table.

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About Dave Lieber

Dave Lieber fights for you. For 40 years, he’s investigated, interviewed and written newspaper columns and stories that point out problems and try to find solutions.

FUN GUY: A popular keynote speaker and entertainer, humorist and Certified Speaking Professional, Dave exhibits the tireless enthusiasm of a puppy. But this watchdog has determination like no other.

RISK TAKER: He rode a bull in a rodeo (or two), interviewed the Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, lived in a nudist colony for three days for a story and once helped solve a murder.

AWARD-WINNING:DailyBeast.com named one of his columns one of the 10 best in the U.S. in 2014. Dave is a winner of the Will Rogers Humanitarian Award for his work on behalf of the community from the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. The award goes to a columnist whose work “best exemplifies the high ideals of the beloved philosopher-humorist who used his platform for the benefit of his fellow human beings."

TEXAS VOLUNTEER: Dave won for his work creating and leading Summer Santa, one of North Texas’ largest and most successful children’s charities.

FOUR Fs: Here’s how this is going to go; I love food, it’s no secret. Pecan Lodge is tops and nothing beats sitting on a Padre Island shore with a $1 Stripes taco and a fruit cup.
For that reason I add “food” to the most important Fs of life – faith, family, friends – in that order. I was glad to learn that The Dallas Morning News publisher Jim Moroney holds high those Fs, too.

KEEP MOVING: I am Texan, (Mexican by perfect design) so because nothing stands between me and tacos or barbecue, I must dance and dance a lot to hit my annual biometric screening marks. Brazilian Samba at United Dance Academy does the trick.
Four kids (one who’s now an adult) help keep me active.
Piper and Chief Inspector Jacques Clouseau only need me for water, food, exercise and cuddles, because they are a Miniature Schnauzer and a Yorkie.

FOURTH ESTATE: Also a newsman, my husband works as hard as I do to keep up with everything.
But worry not. I’ve got you covered on the Watchdog front, helping Dave investigate, report, research, and analyze everything we publish in print, digitally, and in broadcasts. I also happen to manage this page.
I began reporting for the Arlington Morning News and bounced around The New York Times, People Newspapers and the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas.